Shift
by GirlDressedInBlack
Summary: The Mistress sits in her cage and feels the world shift around her. When her memories finally resettle she is greeted by a cold Doctor and the only other person who can remember the original past. Alternate Universe where the monks actually do change the past and only the Mistress and Bill remember and have to cope with the changes as best they can.
1. Chapter 1

So I actually quite like this as an ongoing story idea (which would probably end up shipping Bill and Missy in this new timeline- not going to lie). Say if you want me to because I don't promise regular updates but I can promise I'll work on it.

* * *

The Mistress runs her fingers across the keys, breathing in again the stagnant air. It moves in and out like she wishes she could of her cell. She's been here for a long time now- not quite the one thousand years but close enough. The Doctor had been exceptionally kind for these years.

She supposed.

After all he could have just killed her or left her alone in here without anything to entertain herself.

In return she plays for him sometimes. More she plays for herself and picks music she knows he likes if she can sense him beyond those doors. He brings her food sometimes. When he remembers so when he is hungry which suits her just fine because they seem to be strangely synced after all these years almost cohabiting.

She likes it best when he brings her stories though. Stories about dying are the best because in her better moments it's hilarious to hear about how some apes almost died and in her worse moments she can imagine that she is the one who is being killed.

He always has been good at telling stories.

She presses one finger down, letting the note ring out in her glass box.

Something in time shifts. She feels the shudder go through her as millions of tiny little things change. Her head hits the keys but she doesn't hear the song it plays.

"So you're just going to keep me?" Echoes around in her mind. Her first question to him. The answer swims from 'I swore an oath to protect you' to a simple 'yes'.

Ah- so her Doctor- something's happening to him. She manages to hold the original answer in her mind, grasps tightly to it as she feels everything since then attempt to crumble and reform.

When her memories stop trying to overwrite each other her head aches, processing two different timelines at the same time.

She forces herself to remain conscious- just enough to sort through everything. All she knows is that her Doctor is in danger, she can't lose herself now and risk forgetting…

After five hours, twenty-nine minutes and forty-one seconds the Mistress lifts her head.

The keys are imprinted along her face and she has shifted the new memories aside, firmly insisting on the old ones.

She hears footsteps at the door. The familiar weight of the Doctor's feet hasn't changed but there's a lighter step beside it. Judging by the gaps between steps and how many steps are taken against the Doctor's own stride she would say that it's a new companion, definitely human, most likely female.

Something from her old memories twinges and she gasps in pain, fighting against her body's instincts to stand and face the door in this timeline.

She will not stand for him. She is the Mistress and she will win.

The Doctor does not call out before he opens the door. Referencing her new set of memories says that this has been the case for several hundred years. She frowns, elbows lightly coming to rest against the keys so as not to bring out any sound. She taps her fingers together, flicking through a few more scenes to get a better idea of this Doctor.

Her heartbeats pick up as the door opens and she ignores this response, squashing down on- is that fear ? Almost but not quite. Apprehension? Nervousness? Something like that. This timeline has invoked in her a slight compulsion to worry at the Doctor's arrival. She digs a little deeper, rummaging through millions of moments to find the root of the emotion.

"Missy." The way he says her name bombards her with all the things she'd been searching for. The Mistress manages to hold back a cry as she lets her face go blank.

He is displeased. She knows him well enough to know that tone of voice.

She turns around at once, letting herself fall into the memories to at least get her through this moment. Elegantly she plucks up her skirt, curtsying low, head bowed. She forgoes the theatrics.

"Doctor." She murmurs, voice low. She waits in that position until she senses the incline of his head. Then she stands, eyes finding his directly opposite her on the other side of the glass. She does not blink or look away.

Rasillon how much she wants him right now- the old her- the one that isn't from this new timeline.

He nods, going to the only seat in the room and sitting down. She can see his companion is uncomfortable with the whole situation and dips into her mind.

Ah. She remembers. In fact she's the one who caused this whole mess. The Mistress is irked, thankful and ever so slightly flattered by the human.

Annoyed that she messed up history so badly and was currently giving the Time Lady a huge headache. Irritated that the human had been able to accidentally corrupt the Doctor more than all of her painstaking attempts to do the same. Grateful that she had because the thoughts it is filling the Mistress' head with are all incredibly... entertaining.

And then flattered by the huge flashing 'Oh-my-god-she-is-so-attractive-she-could-kill-me-right-now-fuck-why-is-she-so-hot?' short circuiting the human's mind. Only slightly though. The human is still only a human.

The human- she thinks the Doctor had called her Bill at some point- follows hesitantly, coming to stand at the Doctor's left.

"So you just keep your best friend in a display case?" Questions the human with a touch of outrage the Mistress appreciates.

The Doctor either doesn't hear it or doesn't care.

"Play." He commands, eyes fixed on the Time Lady.

The Mistress gasps a little, a ghost of a smirk making its way to her lips as she sinks to the piano stool, thighs pressed tightly together. Of course she disguises it as anxiety, even adding a bite of the lip as she flicks her gaze over her shoulder.

She begins to play his favourite song, automatically finding the keys beneath her fingers.

"She's evil." He says after a few moments to his companion, "Aren't you Missy?" He says louder, as if she couldn't hear him perfectly.

The Mistress turns, still playing, fixing her eyes on the human's.

"Queen of Evil." She mutters demurely.

The look of disgust that passes over Bill's face is almost enough to make the Mistress break character.

"She doesn't look very evil. " She says firmly.

The Mistress turns back to the piano.

"In fact- I would say she's the least likely person in this room to be evil. You're keeping her in a cage Doctor. In a glass cage. " The human lets out a ragged breath, sounding on the edge of tears.

"I'm protecting her." He says under his breath, voice low as he watches her play.

Bill scoffs.

" Protecting her? She's playing music at your command in a cage! Do you even know what this looks like Doctor?" Bill's voice trembles and- oh dear- the human is crying now. Crying over her. It's touching- it really is. The Mistress is almost laughing.

The Doctor is silent.

"It looks like slavery." She says horrified, "Doctor, it looks like slavery." The Doctor still says nothing and the song comes to an end, petering out into the sound of breathing.

All three of them are still.

The Doctor stands.

"Trust me Bill. Without hope. Without witness. Without reward. She is my friend." The Mistress hears him lift his arm.

"I have to go." He says solemnly. He turns and the Mistress does too. She stands from the stool softly, watching him leave. The human stares between them, heartbroken. She strides over to the glass separating them and stops beside the Time Lady.

"I'm not leaving her, Doctor." She says firmly. The Doctor stops for a moment and a sigh lifts his shoulders.

"She's dangerous Bill, more than you could imagine." He says, voice rough. Bill doesn't even look at the Mistress.

"You keep saying that." She bites back. Time stretches on, suspending them in uncertainty.

The Doctor breaks it.

"Please Bill. Be careful." He says, finally leaving.

The human looks at her, placing a hand against the glass.

"I'll get you out."

Something in the more damaged her from this new timeline reacts to this.

The Mistress feels her heart warm, hope blossom there in conflict with her old memories and self.

"Thank you." She whispers, pressing her hand against the glass, opposite the humans.

"Bill." She finishes, eyes intent on the young woman's.


	2. Chapter 2

The next day the Doctor comes again.

The Mistress presumes it's the next day anyway- her time sense has never stepped out of kilter in all of her lives.

Six months.

Is what it tells her- how long it tells her he had been gone.

He stands outside the door and she thinks for a second he will hesitate.

The doors open and he steps inside, calmer than yesterday.

Missy feels that strange nervousness well up again and stands. She curtseys as she had yesterday. She notices that the human- Bill- isn't with him.

When she looks up again she sees the two large plastic bags hanging by his sides. With the sight of them she remembers the sensation of hunger- something that had plagued her previous regeneration but something that hadn't bothered this one so much until this moment.

"I'm sorry Nardole and I haven't been here to make sure you've had food." He says. Despite the care in his actions his voice is flat. In the small amount of time she can hold his gaze before her new memories force her to drop it she likes to think she can see the guilt which the him from the old time line would have had.

"It's okay." She says and it really is. Her new memories don't want to upset him by saying something wrong.

Although six months would be far too long for a human to survive for Time Lords it's still, well, it's not cutting it _too_ close. She was a lot more practised in going without than most Time Lords anyway and this regeneration really does have an almost worrying lack of self-preservation instincts.

She is very hungry though.

The silence from the Doctor emphasises how different this version is from the old one. The old Doctor would probably have argued with her if she had said that about something as vital as not eating.

He never had been very good with mental defences- he must have been completely wiped out.

The Mistress hopes beyond everything- new and old memories alike- that he's buried beneath everything.

"Where's your human?" She asks. Her new memories cringe a little at her tone but the Mistress does not take the question back, curious. Has he locked the human up somewhere away from a corrupting influence like her? To stop the human corrupting the version of her that she should be in this new timeline?

The Doctor unlocks her cage and she remains standing until the Doctor sighs and answers;

"I've given her leave to speak to you when she wants. If she wants to do something stupid I am at no liberty to stop her." The Time Lord replies, "Now come and eat." He says, allowing no argument.

Missy steps from the cage, fingers closed around one of the pieces of metal holding up the heavily reinforced glass.

As she does she's hit by anxiety which folds her over, a double blow, strong from her new memories and slight from her old ones.

Something spins and she's breathing fast- too fast- what's going on?

Then there's a hand, tight around her right wrist and fingers biting into the flesh of her left arm, holding her in a resemblance of a standing position.

"Missy!"

Her hearts are beating far too quickly, she can feel them in her chest, too fast, too fast!

"Stop." She mutters weakly, word slipping from her mouth as her head aches.

"What? Missy!" Shouts that voice again, echoing in her head, too full and empty and too loud and too much.

"Stop it! Stop it! What are you doing? Missy!" And that voice is the Doctor she realises as her pains begin to ease a little.

Her eyes snap open and she manages to lift her head, teeth clenched and eyes wet to look at him in front of her.

He's scared- she can see that as clear as day.

It feels like a victory even as her vision blinks out.

When the Time Lady wakes up the Doctor is gone.

She pushes herself up from the floor in confusion, feeling the surprising softness of blankets and pillows beneath her. The Mistress presses her hands into them, testing the reality.

She looks at the door in confusion, remembering the fear on the Doctor's face.

Why had the new him done this? Had she held on to the enclosure for longer than she expected past when she passed out and the Time Lord had gathered them to prevent her from damaging herself when she fell?

The smell of food distracts her from that thought and she looks up. Just beside her is a small table- an end table. Solid. Wood. It sits beside the piano stool which seems to have moved too.

The Mistress stands, feeling none of the pain from earlier and sits on the stool, facing the table.

On it are two white plastic bags, full of food.

The new part of her is nervous, believing the food to be some kind of trap. Missy ignores it. There had never been an instance of that in her new memories and she's far too hungry to care.

The Mistress sees the knife and fork sitting on top of one of the bags and picks them up before she's thought about the action and is eating.

It's only when she's half-way through the second bag that her hunger has abated enough for her to turn the fork in front of her in confusion, wondering why she didn't just use her hands like her last regeneration had.

Memories push at her from the new set and she grimaces at the disapproval the Doctor shows of her eating habits, translated through this nervous version of her into something terrifying rather than merely quite annoying.

 _That would explain it_. She thinks as she rubs at her temple with one hand, the other already going to back to the food although she's barely processed what any of it is or tastes like.

Take out of some form according to the bags and plastic packaging- she'd lived off of a lot worse and any food tastes like heaven when she's not eaten for a long time anyway.

When she has finished she looks around, trying to see if anything else has changed in her enclosure.

Nothing else has other than what she had already seen.

The piano has been moved closer to the walls, the stool that she's sitting on with it and on the left end the table she was sitting at sat, plastic bags of empty plastic containers with a knife and fork made of metal all that is left of her meal. On the floor are all the blankets and pillows from her bed collected into a semblance of a nest.

She's briefly surprised by the fact she's been given things which could be used as weapons- surely the Doctor couldn't have been so thoughtless?

Of course- this reality's version of her has been using cutlery for most of the time she's been in the vault. Obviously he'd conditioned at least some of her more destructive impulses out of her.

The Mistress flops herself back against the stool, thinking.

Her head falls off the other end and she sitting up again almost instantly, straddling the bench as she stares at the small gap between the glass wall and the bar it should be locked into.

He'd left it open?

Missy feels a frisson of the earlier fear catch her and gasps, hand going to the middle of her chest, fingertips gentle.

She closes her eyes and calms herself.

Anxiety.

That's all it is.

She opens her eyes again.

The Doctor must think that she's too scared to get out of the enclosure after the six months and increased entrapment the her of her new memories endured.

It was true.

But that didn't mean that she couldn't overcome it. She'd crushed other things limiting her power and she can remember what not being scared was like- all she has to do is recondition herself to the outside slowly. If he kept leaving her cage open then all the more opportunity for it- what she would do with herself then she did not know but when she came up with a plan- when she came up with a plan.

The Mistress stood.

Step 1: Escape the constraints of her mind.

Step 2: Get rid of the monks somehow.

Step 3: Figure out where to go from there.


	3. Chapter 3

Sorry for the angst- it was meant to be _slightly_ more lighthearted than this. Next chapter's on the second of September.

* * *

Missy is holding onto the glass frame tentatively yet determinedly, in the same position she has been in for hours, fighting against her own mind as half attempts to recoil from the outside world of her enclosure.

It may not seem that way from the lax way her fingertips press against the glass, smudging small prints around the safely smoothed edge which they barely curl around.

Regardless the interruption of Bill changes that, throws her mind out of balance enough for her to almost fall backwards, stomach roiling and hand far too stiff, seemingly stuck in that tense moment as she tried to make it push open the door.

She stands beside the chair, one hand burning in stillness as the other comes to her chest in a fist as if it could still her beating hearts by holding them together. The Mistress stares wide-eyed at the human, denying her new memories the opportunity to apologise and beg she doesn't tell the Doctor.

Bill closes the Vault doors behind her, pushing them back with her whole body as she reacts reflexively to that clink of a gap between the glass door and the metal frame of Missy's cage.

She's not really scared. She'd been given nothing concrete to fear over and she pities the Mistress somewhat.

Still she lets herself fall back against the door, shocked by Missy's sudden movement or suddenly feeling all the Doctor's warnings rushing back to her or something.

"I'm." The Mistress says- feeling like she has to explain herself but not able to find the words.

She lets herself fall further, making a split second choice between the veritable nest on the floor or the piano stool, and comes down with a thump on the padded seat.

Better to stay at the same height. She didn't need pity or to be seen as nothing more than a child.

The Time Lady thinks to try to speak but can't, eyes locked with the human's as they size each other up.

Eventually Bill does, walking cautiously towards the seats outside her cell and saying nothing of the door.

"Are you alright?" She asks nervously as she picks up one of the metal folding chairs and drags it as close to the glass as she dares, "Only I think I might have made you jump with the door and I didn't mean to. Just forgot to tell you I was coming in." The human says with enough concern that Missy can tell she is genuinely worried but enough lee-way in the words that if the asking has upset the Time Lady she can deny it.

The Mistress breathes in and out deeply.

"It's okay." She confirms, somehow wanting to be honest with Bill because the human was so earnest herself. She can't bring herself to say more, uncertain if she is meant to acknowledge that she had been making what could have been seen as an escape attempt or the fact that it is still viable and Bill hasn't made an attempt to stop it.

The human fits awkwardly in the chair, seeming to be someone who fits much better with movement. The dark clothes seem strange too although that is all she has seen the human in. She can only imagine her in brighter colours from what the Doctor had told her in the old timeline. She seems too washed out, too small in the clothes she is wearing- they don't fit the big personality that the Doctor had painted her as.

Bill is silent for a moment, looking at the Mistress.

"Yeah- I. That's good." She says, nodding as if the whole situation wasn't as vividly wrong as it is. Then she deflates, slumping forwards as her hands come up to nest in her hair.

The Mistress waits.

"I tried to save the Doctor." Bill blurts out, not looking at Missy, "And it went wrong and I just. I know you probably can't tell but I've got to hope that even if the Doctor's forgotten you'll somehow have remembered something- even some small part of you because he didn't and now he's like _that_ and- you probably don't even know the difference but I have to try- I have- I have to do something! I can't just not do anything. Even if I'm just telling you it's not like you'll tell anyone- I saw the way you looked at him last night and- you just wouldn't. I just- I need someone to talk to- someone who doesn't think I'm going mad." The human chatters on, clearly distressed but unable to stop herself when she gets started.

There's too much silence when she finishes and Missy can hear time slowly ticking by around them, counting out the oppressive silence as Bill stares at her, looking for any kind of reaction.

The Mistress purses her lips, the slightest of frowns drawing her eyebrows down.

"When I last took care of the monks it involved the destruction of the family line who had allowed the monks in." The Time Lady says, understanding that her guess that Bill had invited them in was correct from the extra tension in her shoulders and the slight movement back and away from Missy. "Their civilisation collapsed without the monks to uphold it. They had been under their control for so long none of them had even the locked away memories of what it had been like before their history was rewritten." She adds, staring into the human's eyes without moving one muscle.

"Having your life rewritten is devastatingly painful. You know that now. That's why people forget. I should want to kill you but my new timeline finds the whole idea repulsive." The Mistress admits plainly.

Bill shudders at the almost threat but nothing can squash the relief and fear mixing on her face like oil and water.

She stands, throat making an odd noise as she reaches out to the Time Lady despite the glass in the way.

"You. You remember!" She says, waving her arms up and down before coming to against the glass as she moves closer.

And then she bursts out crying and Missy isn't sure what she's meant to do at all so stays stock still on her seat, eyes still fixed on the human.

Eventually she stops crying, curled and pressed against the glass.

Missy still hasn't moved.

"I'm so sorry." Bill says, rubbing her reddened eyes, "I'm still glad you remember. I'm glad you don't want to kill me either." Then she pauses and straightens up, hands in fists by her sides.

"What would happen if we took the monks down now?" The human asks, looking beside the Time Lady's head, lips thin.

The Mistress can tell what she's thinking already and it hurts her a little- more than she ever could have expected- and she hears the child's screaming as she kicks them down into the volcano and she's laughing but that isn't her now- neither timeline has that version of her anymore- but she can feel her stomach churning and her hearts beating far too fast and her teeth are clenched so hard together she can feel the tension in the headache like fire which flares into being and her lungs are burning too.

"Missy- Missy!" And there is a hand on her arm and one on her forehead, so warm but she's clammy herself and she shudders but it's enough- just enough- to pull her out of it with a gasp.

She squeezes her eyes tight shut and accepts the comfort offered to her, pressing her head hard against a shoulder and wrapping her arms tightly around a back, pulling closer as if her regenerations depended on it.

The human- because it is the human and now Missy is in the present enough to hear the single heart beat which sounds so frail so close to her- holds her gently, hands running over her back again and again in a soothing motion.

"It's okay. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." She murmurs, her own cheek leaned on the top of Missy's head.

The Mistress knows in some sense that she should reject the support or remind the human of how dangerous she is but she can't bring herself to, instead letting herself shudder with every sob which dampens Bill's too dark clothes.

She's almost stopped when Bill speaks anything other than consolations, still holding onto her.

"What would happen?" She asks again, hand finding the back of Missy's neck and gently running her thumb over the skin there as the Time Lady stiffens a little, stopping her from slipping back into the memory.

"On this planet. Now. Everyone would remember what their original past had been. They would tear down the statues and rewrite all the knowledge the monks had eradicated which they could know. There would be world peace as every country shared all the knowledge it had, desperately trying to verify the truth of their world. Everyone would know about aliens and precautions would be taken. The world would become safer." The Mistress says, voice hoarse, near collapsed over the human.

"Then kill me." Bill says firmly, sniffing as she pulls away, a hand on each of Missy's shoulders.

"If it would do all of _that_ \- even if there were no monks- _kill me_." Bill insists, voice beginning to break as she pleads.

And all the Time Lady, ex-Queen of Evil who burned cities just to watch the smoke, can do is tremble.

"I can't." She says honestly.

She lifts shaking arms to land on Bill's shoulders then changes her mind, fingers trailing up her neck to her face as she cups the human's head in her hands.

"I'm sorry but I just can't." The Mistress says with eyes blurring.


	4. Chapter 4

Next chapter on either the 4th of November.

* * *

"Why not? You've done it before for… Not very good reasons. But now- this could save the world. This could make Earth a better place. You would be a hero- you would have done a good thing! I know that you regret the people you've hurt before but could you even bring yourself to regret me? You hardly know me and it would do so much good when all I've done is fucked up everything! Please. Missy." The human begs, hands finding Missy's and pulling them down into her own, gripping them tightly.

"You've got to see how good this would be!" Bill pleads, crying herself with the desperation of the situation and how much she wants to live despite all of this.

"I can't- you. I know I don't know you well but the Doctor- in the old timeline- he spoke about you with such pride. He would never forgive me. I could never forgive me. I don't care about being a hero. When I was locked up in here I declared 'without hope, without reward, without witness'. That is my vow. I am trying to be good. I have no hope. I will have no reward and it won't be witnessed." The Mistress says, shivering, "I know I don't know you but everything you have done that I have heard of emits goodness and hope. To kill you would be evil. The benefits don't come into moral decisions. I'm sorry but I can't kill you so there will have to be some other way." Missy finishes, squeezing Bill's hands and staring into her eyes earnestly and with the certainty only those who refuse all other options have.

"I will make another way." The Time Lady says, eyes hard with strength and the power she has always worn, turned to good ends for the first time in her memory.

"But- if you just-" The human cries, swallowing. She feels guilt even as she tries to summon the strength to argue for her own death.

"No. I will not kill you. I never could." The Mistress finds the words easily and finds them true.

"We need a plan. Another way to defeat the monks." The Time Lady says.

Bill agrees with silence, taking a hand from Missy's and wiping her eyes.

"We need a way to override the connection the monks are promoting through you. Something powerful- something too big for their minds to process. They've got to be promoting this new set of memories using you as the final connection. Time is… Complex… Not that easy to mess with." The Mistress says, thinking aloud.

"They've changed the past and rewritten the world but everyone here who exists still is a fixed point from the old world and they will all have those memories locked inside them. If we can just get in their main control centre and send out a signal so powerful they can't keep it contained- a pure memory of the old world. That should be enough to open the box in their brain shutting away the knowledge they don't need in this timeline. All we need is everything we have!" The Time Lady says, grin coming on slowly as she looks past the woman in front of her.

The Mistress' gaze snaps to Bill who gasps a little, tears gradually stopping and she feels alive, energetic, ready to go. It's the first time her new timeline has felt like this and the emotion is like a beacon in her- a lighthouse in a storm.

The Mistress laughs.

She can't stop herself, joy bubbling through her as she grabs the human and holds her close, laughter shaking her as she cries with it.

Gently, gently, it too comes to a close and the Mistress pulls back, silent.

Her lips have gone slack and she stares past Bill seeming lost.

"Are you alright?" The human asks, eyebrows lowering and one hand going to Missy's shoulder as she stops laughing too. She's still blushing from the close contact with the Time Lady but her worry is far stronger than her happiness.

"What is it?" She asks when her previous question gets no response.

The Mistress doesn't quite look at her but her vision does focus a little more.

"I. All we need. It's the memories in our heads. All we need is the memories in our heads and to be in their headquarters." She says, voice dull.

"And?" Bill asks, grin growing again despite her confusion, "Isn't that good? No machines to rely on, no gadgets to be built?" Her smile falters a little with the Time Lady's lack of response.

"Isn't it?" She asks again.

The Mistress comes back to herself and folds her legs neatly beneath her, hands evenly apart on her thighs as she looks at Bill seriously.

"I can't leave here." She says gravely.

The human laughs, incredulous.

"Well of course you can. The door's right there and I know how to open it. All you do is get up, walk out with me and we save the world!" She declares, smiling.

"No." Missy says calmly, "You don't understand. I can't leave _here_. I can't leave this space- this room- this _box_. Something over this changed timeline has made me afraid of the outside of this cage. I can't even open that glass door." The Mistress says, hands balling into fists, frustrated with herself.

"You're in my space and I should hate it but I can't and I can't leave either." The Time Lady says, tears of irritation sinking into the fabric of her skirt as her breath hitches, "Even this crying- I wouldn't ever have cried at this before." She adds, arms wrapping around her own waist.

"I'm- I'm so sorry. I didn't think. That's so insensitive- oh my god! I'm so sorry!" Bill fumbles, blushing and waving her hands in front of her face as if to ward off the unintentional cruelty.

"The Doctor- he must have-" The human starts.

"No." Missy interrupts her, firm, "The Doctor has been very careful, very firm with me this timeline but he never would do anything like that no matter the circumstances. It's psychological. Completely psychological. I've never been sane. The Doctor isn't to blame- it's all in my head." The Time Lady says, eyes meeting Bill's somewhat challengingly.

Bill rears back defensively, hands up.

"Woah- I was just thinking. I'm only human- stupid remember." She jokes, trying to lighten the mood.

Bill takes one of the Mistress' hand between both of her own.

"I'll help you get out." She promises.

The Mistress feels something settle between her hearts and finds herself smiling in spite of the tears and distress and her self-frustration.

"I know." The Time Lady decides upon, looking into Bill's eyes, "I know you will." She says more softly.

The Mistress brings her legs up in front of her, slumping over them. Bill releases the hand she holds and the Time Lady wraps them both around her legs.

She closes her eyes and breathes out, head resting against her knees. Her eyes blink open and she looks at Bill from that position, suddenly exhausted.

"So plan is we get me out of here, find out where the monks' secret hideout is, I go in and blow their systems to smithereens, you humans live in a utopian world?" She asks, smiling a little and feeling more of the her from the old timeline.

Bill smiles, amused by the strange position the other woman sits in.

"Well, yeah. That's all we've got right now. I can try and see what I can find out outside and help you get used to being outside this box again and then _we_ can go and get rid of the monks. It's my fault and I'm going to help solve it." Bill says without room for discussion.

Missy smiles, offering her hand out to Bill again playfully.

"Team Fix-Our-Mistakes?" She suggests.

"Team Fix-Our-Mistakes." Bill agrees, laughing a little as she puts her hand in Missy's and they shake on it.

They both chuckle at the levity in the middle of their troubles.

"Do you want to try opening the door with me?" Bill asks, nervous with her hand still in the Mistress'.

"I-" The Time Lady goes stiff but the human squeezes her hand reassuringly. Missy bites at her lips and curls up a little smaller but lets out a loud sigh.

"I- yes. I should. We should try." She agrees, swallowing at the fear which clogs her throat.

Missy squeezes the human's hand back.


	5. Chapter 5

Next chapter's on the 6th of January.

* * *

The Mistress sits at the boundary between her cage and the rest of her room, leaning heavily against the left side of the door with her eyes squeezed shut and hands clenched over her knees, knuckles white. She forces a shaking breath out through her mouth and breathes in again through her nose.

Bill sits beside her, right leg pressed against Missy's left in a grounding gesture. She nudges her slightly and the Time Lady's breath hitches and the human grabs her left tightly between her own.

"It's okay. You're doing really well." She murmurs soothingly, squeezing harder until she gets a nod from the Mistress. Gently she releases her hand again.

"Remember when you couldn't even open this door a few hours ago? You're doing really well." Bill says with a concerned smile, leaning against Missy so that she knows that there's someone else with her, "You'll get this in no time."

All the Mistress can feel is heat- she knows she sweating a lot- can feel it in the way her hearts are beating faster and the way every breath tastes damp. She nods again, managing to open her eyes while every other part of her is pulled taut.

"I should be able to do this. This is easy." She whispers, not capable of much more as her eyelids flutter again and she swallows.

Bill is there though, leaning against her side. Missy grabs her hand, biting her lip and knowing she's holding too tight.

"That's okay. You're getting better- you're doing really well and that's what's important." The woman reassures, bearing the pain with slightly gritted teeth.

They sit in silence for a few more seconds, half a minute, each dealing with their pains until the Mistress curls in on herself.

"Enough for now." She manages to hiss out, head buried against her thighs and arms wrapped around them, pulling herself tight as she trembles.

"That's okay. You're doing really well." Bill tells her, used to the way Missy pulls back from her fear by now. The human holds her and the Mistress leans into her, finding comfort in the contact even though the heartbeat is half of what she's used to. She lets out part of a sob.

Bill tucks the Time Lady into her chest, eyes open as she runs her hand over Missy's back,"It's okay. We'll get there. It's okay." She repeats, rocking slightly with her.

The Mistress follows the movements, shuddering as she just breathes, calming herself. Weakly she releases her arm from her own grasp and fists her hand into Bill's shirt, barely managing to keep hold of the fabric as she shakes.

"It's just- I haven't left this space in six months."

Bill can only just hear her even as close as they are pressed together. She sighs and just hugs the Time Lady.

"I'm sorry." She says, no other way that she can reply to that.

Missy pushes them apart a little, not raising her head.

"Don't apologise when it's not your fault." She murmurs, eyes still closed. The Time Lady shivers.

"It kind of is though." Bill reminds her, grimacing.

"Yeah." Missy replies after a pause then;

"You're an idiot." Which holds no heat with her forehead against the human's chest.

The Mistress sighs and sits up again, opening her eyes and loosening her grip on Bill's shirt.

"Again." She says, meeting the other woman's eyes directly.

Bill frowns, "Are you sure? You've done a lot of pushing yourself today and the Doctor will probably come to give you food soon." She says worriedly, hands on the Time Lady's shoulders who feels strangely small despite knowing what the alien is capable of.

There's a moment of contention but the Mistress droops, dropping her gaze and placing her hand over Bill's.

"Okay. We've- _I've_ \- I've done enough today." She agrees, relaxing already at the thought of not experiencing the irrational fear for a while.

"You have. You've done really well." Bill says with a grin, rubbing Missy's shoulder, "I know you don't think that but you're doing really well." She repeats, knowing how frustrated the Mistress is by the fact she's scared of something so simple and integral to their plan and how shaken she's been by pushing herself enough to even sit at the boundary between her cage and the rest of the room.

"Tomorrow?" The Mistress asks, gaze lifting as she looks Bill in the eyes, "You'll be back and we'll try again?"

Bill nods, "As soon as I can be. We're going to do this Missy." She says certainly.

"We're going to do this." The Mistress agrees, a hint of a smile on her lips as Bill helps her to her feet.

The Time Lady resituates herself at her piano, laying her splayed fingers against the keys as she feels her heart rates gradually resettle.

"Do you want me to close the door?" Bill asks, standing on the threshold.

The Mistress feels a frisson of joy as she realises that she isn't as disturbed as before by the idea of the door being open and smiles at the keys shining beneath her hands.

"Yes. Mostly. The Doctor forgot to close it properly I think- leave it a little bit open." She says, turning to the human as she steps back and puts the glass door between them again.

Bill returns the smile, glad to see the Time Lady's spirits rising already.

"I'll see you tomorrow." She says, waving a little.

"Tomorrow." The Mistress confirms, tilting her head at the door and playing a few notes.

"I know. I know." Bill reassures her as she leaves.

The Vault doors close heavily behind her and moments later the Mistress hears the locking mechanisms click into place.

* * *

The doors unlock and Missy quiets her playing, listening for a second before she's standing, watching him with that strange anxiety, guilt, worry feeling in her chest. She curtseys to him as he enters.

"Doctor." She murmurs, head bowed for the second she holds it.

"Mistress." He greets her back evenly.

It's strange how just a name makes so much difference but she would give anything for him to call her Missy now- a nickname rather than the formality of her chosen title- despite how much she had always wanted him to call her Mistress before.

Some part of her clamours for his approval and she pushes it down as he approaches, almost going to step forwards but remaining in her place, the only outwards sign of her conflicted emotions the slight adjustment of her right foot beneath her skirts.

He looks at the table in her room in confusion, eyebrows lowering. His eyes flicker to her and then back to the table.

"Did you move it?" He asks, genuinely confused as he steps forwards and then notices the pile of cushions and blankets folded beside it along with a wooden chair.

"I- no. I didn't." The Mistress mutters, eyes just not meeting his, "I thought you did." She adds, standing completely still. The Time Lady looks into eyes and the Doctor frowns, hand going to his face as he stares at the new additions to the glass room within the room.

"Then who?" The Doctor asks, lips parted in pure confusion as he sees Missy is telling the truth, "If Bill or Nardole had done it you would have known and each of us would know if we'd done it. Neither Bill of Nardole have access to the codes to get in either." He frowns and then a strange blankness seems to come over him.

"I've brought you dinner." The Time Lord says, eyes glazed slightly. He walks closer to the enclosure and the Mistress feels some shock go through her, stepping up to the glass.

"Doctor?" She asks softly then more concerned when he barely seems to hear it, "Doctor?" The Mistress says, volume increasing as she begins to truly worry. He opens the door and she forgets her current timeline, grabbing his arm.

"Doctor?" The Time Lady asks, eyebrows descending, grasping both arms now and shaking him slightly.

He doesn't show any kind of reaction and she chances a brush against his mind which sends her reeling and- Rassilon- she can't even tell what's happening in there!

A ghost of sentience passes over him as he releases the bag on the table and she feels anxiety begin to press in again and lets him go, backing away as if stung.

The Doctor steps out and closes the door his cold gaze filtering back over his face as he types in the code and the glass cage seals shut again.

"Goodnight, Mistress." He says as he turns and leaves.

The door to the Vault closes behind him and she hears it seal shut again moments later.

"Goodnight, Doctor." She whispers to the ghost of him.

The Time Lady steps back up to the table and opens the bag, pulling each plastic container out.

They're her favourites. That peanut chicken thing, rice and chip-shop gravy.

There's no knife and fork.

At the bottom of the bag is a small slip of paper with seven digits on.

4763205.


	6. Chapter 6

Next chapter should be on the 10th of March.

* * *

The Mistress eats woodenly, mechanically, mind stuck on those numbers, repeating them over and over as she chews.

They're already committed to memory and the paper has already been torn into the smallest pieces like grains of rice. They're on the table, put to the side as if she could forget them if they weren't.

She can't help but hope though this timeline's memories plead caution.

Her eyes keep flickering to the door as if drawn by some kind of magnetic force as she eats with her fingers, scooping up handfuls of rice and chicken and gravy and feeling a little more herself for it.

She can't try the code.

The input box is only on the other side.

She needs to wait for Bill.

Missy licks her fingers clean and wipes them on the corner of one of the blankets and almost laughs at the ridiculousness of, well, everything. She only doesn't because she's stuck in it.

The Mistress doesn't sleep that night, gaze fixed on the doors as she waits for them to open.

It's okay. Time Lords don't need as much sleep as humans.

* * *

The Doctor arrives before Bill.

She should have predicted it really given her new memories but she hasn't really been focused since those numbers.

Missy scrambles to her feet to curtsey as he closes the door behind him.

"Morning." He greets somewhat tersely and she mumbles the same greeting back as he unlocks her cage and starts clearing up the remnants of her dinner. He spares no glance for the tiny bits of paper as he sweeps them into the container that had held the rice.

The Time Lord ties the bag shut and places another on the table. Paper this time. The Mistress can smell the pastries inside it behind the strong smell of coffee.

This is unusual.

Even from the old timeline he would only do this when he wanted something from her- information or advice on something that seemed important to him. Sometimes if he was in a good mood.

She looks at him, tries to find something in his face, some indicator of how he's feeling, what this is for.

They are very still for a moment, both staring at each other.

"Can I sit?" He asks as she stands in front of the piano stool, fingers twisted together in front of herself.

The Doctor is opposite her, on the other side of the table.

The Mistress can't read him like this.

He just seems possibly tired; blanked out and hollow.

She nods belatedly as he waits then pulls the piano stool a little closer to the table and nods twice in rapid succession, one hand going to her face as she struggles with her own confusion.

"Y-yes." Missy says, voice stuttering as she hastens to reply in a way that she hates.

"Sorry- I couldn't sleep." She mumbles, attempting a smile which never meets her eyes before she looks down again, away.

The Doctor sits in the wooden chair opposite her.

The stool screeches a little as it drags along the floor. She sits on it anyway, hears the soft creak as it takes her weight.

There's more silence.

The Doctor slowly opens the bag and the paper makes soft noises as it crumples. He places a cardboard cup in front of her and another smaller paper bag with slight grease stains underneath.

She looks at him in confusion and he nods, bringing out a cup for himself.

"Breakfast." He says simply and the Mistress hesitates for only a second before reaching over and taking the pastry, trying not to look too eager.

It's blueberry- some French thing she thinks. Nicer than cereal in any case.

It flakes apart in her hands and she leaves slight greasy marks on the sleeve of her coffee cup as she sips at it.

While she eats the Doctor waits, periodically drinking his own drink. She thinks it might be tea- it's hard to smell much else over coffee. His eyes don't move from her until she puts her cup down, finally unable to resist asking;

"What is this for?" Her voice is small and she hates the quiet that rings in it.

The Time Lord frowns a little, eyebrows dropping for just a moment before resuming a more neutral position.

"I'm… Proud." He says, tasting the words before he uses them.

"I was worried about Bill coming to see you even with you in here." The Doctor says though the words don't fit right in his mouth.

"Oh." Missy says and takes another sip of her coffee.

He doesn't offer anything more and she doesn't ask for anything more.

The Doctor guides her to the loo and she shakes the whole time. He lets her cling to him to keep herself upright despite the nerves that shoot through her when she does.

Even with her new memories it's easier with him who she has known for thousands of years than Bill to leave her space.

It's okay in there- she's enclosed in a box and no one else is there and it's okay.

Washing her hands feels very good and she washes her face too, welcoming the warmth of the water and soap as it takes away the greasy residue on her skin. She dries them carefully and doesn't look at herself in the mirror.

When she's done she knocks on the door and he pulls it open immediately. The Time Lady flinches back from it a little.

She would have run back to her cage if she hadn't needed his support.

When he leaves he takes the rubbish with him and locks both doors.

The Mistress is still trembling as he leaves, hands clenched in her lap and silent tears squeezing from her shut eyes as she curls into the nest of blankets.

The small haze of victory at being able to manage even that small trip to the bathroom is completely overshadowed by the knowledge that he can't read her anymore either.

The newer half of her memories is trying to fight it with overwhelming happiness at the fact he'd approved of her and helped her.

Missy doesn't know which makes her feel sicker.

* * *

When the Time Lady wakes up there is another bag of food on the table.

She doesn't feel like eating yet so she stays where she is, in the warmth on the floor, just listening to her own breathing as she lets her eyes scan her surroundings.

Somehow she feels more at peace after her rest and her tears.

A chair creaks outside her enclosure and she flinches at the sound, shocked.

"Ah- you're awake! I didn't want to wake you. I don't know how much you sleep." Comes Bill's voice from outside. She sounds somewhat sheepish.

Missy sits up quickly, gasping a little.

"Yes- yes. I'm up. Been up the whole time. I'm a _Time_ Lady- we don't need sleep like you silly humans do." She says, getting to her feet and then laughing a little, wild-eyed, feeling so much like her old self she can't help the grin as she faces Bill.

Bill who shifts backwards a little, clearly attempting a smile.

Bill whose hands come up slightly between them.

Bill who has paled a little and whose mind is rattling through 'mistake', 'Doctor said', 'bad idea' even though she's actively fighting against it.

"Are you alright? You seem a little…" The human trails off, looking the Time Lady up and down cautiously.

Quickly Missy steps forwards towards the glass, frowning.

"Ah- I'm. I feel more like myself now- from the old timeline." She explains, feeling like she has to prove something, unsure what to say to stop the uncertainty in Bill's gaze.

"I can- I could. I can tame it if you like?" The Mistress asks before she can think the words through.

As soon as they are out she regrets them- knows that it's the new her that said that- the one who is eager to please.

She stares at Bill in horror which only relaxes at the expression of guilt on the human's face.

"No. _No._ Don't do that. You just surprised me is all. I'm glad you're feeling better." Bill insists, taking a few steps forwards. She looks at the door and her face twists again into a grimace.

"Even if you are locked up again." The human mutters, sighing in exasperation at both herself and the Doctor. She presses a hand against the glass.

Missy feels herself smile, unable to squash the hope that flows through her.

"Four, seven, six, three, two, zero, five." She recites, lips twitching upwards as she looks at Bill.

The human looks at her in confusion.

"What?" She asks, even more puzzled than before.

"Four, seven, six, three, two, zero, five." The Mistress repeats, "I think it might be the door's code." The Time Lady says, feeling a flutter of nerves run through her chest.


	7. Chapter 7

Next chapter should be on the 5th of May.

* * *

For a moment Bill just stares at her.

"You. How?" She stutters out, eyes wide, hand raising again to point at her, "How did you get that?" The human asks, brows furrowed in confusion.

"And how do you know it will work?" She follows up, frowning.

The Mistress stiffens.

Her fingers clench into fists by her sides and she feels the bite of her nails into her palms, the tightness over her knuckles.

"I don't." She says, chin tilted up and lips pressed together.

She misses not feeling uncertainty.

The heat's rising in her cheeks and she turns to hide it, striding around the perimeter of her cage.

"It was on a piece of paper with my last meal." The Time Lady admits. She ignores how hopeful- how _childish-_ the words sound.

There's another pause as Bill waits for some kind of further explanation.

"You mean-" She begins, looking at Missy incredulously, "You got a piece of paper with some numbers on with your food and you automatically presume that it's something that might help you?" She asks.

"You do realise there's millions more things that the number could actually be?" The human prods, tilting her head in confusion.

The Time Lady bristles, shoulders raising as she turns her head.

"Yes but that doesn't mean that it isn't." She snaps, voice tart.

And Bill just raises her hands in response, puffing out her cheeks and stepping back.

"Okay. Okay. I'm trying it." The human says.

Missy sniffs and turns away again, hands clasping in front of her and squeezing tight.

Rassilon- she hopes that the code is what she thinks it is.

Rassilon- she hopes that the Doctor- _her Doctor_ \- isn't as gone as he might seem.

Rassilon- she wants her friend back more than ever.

She can hear the tapping of the human's shoes as she moves to the door and the breathing, loud in the quiet.

"What were the numbers again?" She asks.

The Mistress recites them, lips almost tingling with the nervousness of what it means if they work.

Missy feels her hearts beat fast in the silence as she watches the reflection of the human in the glass in front of her, hands obscured by a reflected metal beam.

Then there's a brief click and Missy sees the glass door move, reflected again.

Her knees feel weak suddenly and she locks them, unlacing her fingers and placing one hand on the small table to prop her up.

Bill is silent.

"Well it worked." She sums up.

The words make the whole thing sound anticlimactic though the expression of sheer bewilderment the Mistress sees on her mirrored face betrays her voice.

"How did you say you got it?" Bill asks after she's regained control of her face, somewhat suspicious.

"I." Missy stops short, head turned to the side again, eyes dropping to the floor as her mouth hangs open.

She almost doesn't want to say. The implications are clear and part of her wants to keep it to herself, inside where the words don't have as much weight.

The only problem is that she can't lie to Bill and she can't say nothing to her. Not when she's helping her like she is.

"They were on a slip of paper in the bottom of the bag which my food was delivered in, underneath the boxes. Handwritten." Missy states the facts.

Bill is pacing outside the Time Lady's cage, fingers dragging across her scalp as she follows through, clearly just as horrified and worried as Missy feels.

"But that- _anyone_ could have written them. Right? We could just be really lucky, couldn't we?" She asks, clearly not believing her own words as the thoughts travel directly from her head into the air around them.

"Someone was just playing some kind of joke and it worked in our favour, right?" Bill declares.

"I know his handwriting." Missy tells the human, "He wrote the numbers." She says, voice solid and cold. It feels heavy coming from her mouth, like the air should mist with it.

"It can't- he can't be putting us through this- he wouldn't-" Bill keeps talking, filling the air with words which buzz with anxiety until Missy interrupts.

"I know his handwriting, Bill! Not his motives!" She snaps, fists at her sides as she turns to glare at Bill through the glass.

There's silence again as Missy keeps staring at the human.

Bill is almost collapsed on yet another end table scattered around the rest of the room, caught with her hands in her hair, eyes wide and fixed on her, lips parted slightly.

There's shock on her face but of a different kind than the Time Lady was expecting. Colour rises in her cheeks as she realises why. She looks away again.

"I don't know why he's doing it but I choose to believe that the Doctor is good and he is trying to be good." She says quietly, softly, eyes tracing the tiles outside her box as the fingers of one hand run up and down those on her other hand in a way which only somewhat calms her.

"Okay." Bill replies and the word is enough even if Missy knows they'll be discussing this so many more times.

"We should. We should get to getting you out of there then." She says, closing the conversation for now.

Missy sighs, standing a little taller.

"Yes." She agrees as they both move towards the glass door again.

They both reach for the door and Bill pulls back at the last moment, gesturing loosely to Missy.

The Mistress pulls a breath into her chest and closes her eyes briefly as she pushes open the door.

The glass is cold beneath her palm and it moves easily on its hinge.

Eyes still closed Missy takes a single careful step and then another.

She hears Bill move a little closer and lets her hand fall. The pane of glass stays put,

The Mistress opens her eyes and grasps the hand Bill offers from just the other side of the glass to her right.

Holding her breath she steps onto the top step down from her prison.

Bill smiles at her encouragingly, the other hand offered to her too if she needs it.

The Time Lady raises her foot, biting her lip hard at the quaking as she wills it to stop and places it down hard on the next step, firm. The other foot follows onto it and her hand is tightening possibly a little too much on Bill's arm but the human isn't complaining.

Instead Bill moves in front of her, meeting her eyes as she lets the Mistress take both of her hands and pulls lightly.

"You're doing really well." She says reassuringly. Missy feels a ghost of a smile on her own lips despite the nausea rising in her again.

Her eyes are fixed directly on Bill's as she descends another step and then the last to stand on the tiled ground in front of the human.

"You're doing very well today." Bill repeats, words a warm murmur.

The Mistress can't help the hum of a chuckle strangled by the tension that runs through her or the way her lips quirk again at the words or even the curious feeling that they give her of wanting Bill to say them again.


	8. Chapter 8

Next chapter's on the 16th of June.

* * *

Her back is drenched with sweat and it itches as she moves, clothes damp with it. Her hands are clammy in Bill's as she squeezes them tight, sitting on a sofa that Bill had managed to push about five metres away from the enclosure while Missy fretted, teeth in her lips and nails in her palms. She breathes steadily, eyes closed as she tries to control it and soften the leaping of her hearts, too fast in her chest.

She can't do this- not now.

She's doing okay.

She's okay.

She's okay.

She's not having a panic attack- she won't, can't.

She gasps a little in too many emotions to process as Bill shifts, her hand sliding up and down her back comfortingly just once, pressing hard enough that the Time Lady can feel that, focus on that and the feeling of her face, forehead tucked against the human's neck.

She gets a faint impression of the single heart beat, far steadier than her own, far slower, and grasps hold of it in her mind, counting out a slow four beats to match her own beating hearts to.

"You're doing well even just sitting here." Bill soothes.

It's somehow too much.

The Mistress can feel the vibrations of the words as she shudders, lips parted as she tries to control her breathing.

Her hearts are still too fast and she's trembling and she can't hold it back and she can feel the hot tears spill from her eyes as she struggles to breathe, back curving as her hands slip from Bill's and her nails dig into her own palms again, arms coming in to try and hold herself together somehow as her chin curls into her own neck.

She knows she can stop this- she knows she can- she has to-

Somehow those words were too much and her throat hurts, too choked up for her to breathe properly and if she could just-

Her hearts hurt in her chest and she feels Bill's arms wrap around her back, the movements strong.

Even before in the old timeline the Doctor had made her seem so human- so weak but the Mistress can't feel that now- can't think of her like that.

She's just so much- so _good_ \- and Missy is just weak and cruel and spiteful and it's her nature- she knows that but still she just wishes- she just wishes that she could be something other than that her- a her who is better- who is good and kind and loved rather than feared.

But she isn't good enough- she never is.

She can't even stop her throat from closing over.

She can't even stop her hearts from beating too fast.

She can't even stop her mind from spiralling, saying things it can't really believe.

All she can do is crumble into Bill who just holds her and rocks gently, hands soothing up and down her back, saying little.

She bets that Bill thinks all the thoughts that her brain is telling her right now too.

She bets Bill thinks that she's pathetic- useless- a sorry excuse for a Time Lord- not enough.

She bets at the same time that it's just her brain telling her these things and that they aren't real.

It doesn't stop them from hurting.

"It's okay." Bill whispers beyond the tears and the pain and the just-enough air to hyperventilate with and the too loud of her hearts and head.

"I'm here. You can cry if you need to. It's okay." She says again and Missy feels something in her turn as she shudders, a strangled noise coming from her as she takes a shaking breath.

She swallows and leans into Bill, letting herself be held and feeling the almost uncomfortable warmth emanating from her which is okay considering the solidity it comes with.

"You're doing really well." She murmurs after a while, just holding the Time Lady to her.

Eventually the Mistress regains control of herself and pushes away, sitting up a little less straight than normal, exhausted and frustrated with herself. Her eyes itch and she bites at her lip before she releases it, scowling at herself a little for the show of weakness even after _that_.

They are both silent, neither really looking at the other.

Bill keeps peering at Missy from the corner of her eye, fingers twisted up in each other and lips pressed shut.

"I- uh." The human says after a while, fidgeting a little.

"Thank you." Missy states woodenly, folding her arms and shifting back ever so slightly.

"It's uh- no problem." Bill scrapes out and with more of her mental faculties offering their services the Mistress can detect the slight wavering of her voice.

She looks over for only a second and catches Bill looking away, face flushed slightly but more so around her eyes. Her lips are pressed shut tightly, marks on her bottom lip showing the trace of teeth.

The dampness of her eyes hurts something in Missy's hearts and she says nothing, looking away before the glance can be caught in return, teeth clenching.

Five metres was better than nothing and Missy wants now to be back inside her room.

"I'm. I'm going back in now." The Mistress states, "The Doctor will probably be here soon." She says, feeling like she needs an excuse and feeling like she wants Bill to not be here now though some part of her wants her to stay.

It's weak- she decides.

She can't let it win.

"Ah!" Bill is standing in a moment, swallowing and trying to put on an expression other than the one she has and blinking a little more often than usual, "Do you want any help?" She asks, fingers twitching by her side a little as she tries to avoid reaching for Missy.

The Time Lady stands up too, hands firm on the arm of the couch as she straightens up.

"No." She says quickly and then raises her chin.

"It's only over there." The Mistress affirms, still feeling like she has to make excuses.

Bill steps back a little, "Well I'm here if you need me." She says and the Time Lady nods just a little in acknowledgement.

She takes stilted steps back to her room, grip tight on various bits of furniture to support her on the way there in lieu of clinging to Bill.

Five metres is good.

Five metres is enough.

She seats herself at her piano and feels the tension she's been holding ease a little bit.

"You can close the door. He'll expect it closed." The Mistress says over her shoulder to Bill who takes a moment to come into action, nodding and moving forwards.

"Ah. Yeah." The human says, meaning nothing really as she pushes the glass pane back to its original position and hears the lock mechanism click back into life.

She rests her hand against it for a moment longer than she probably should.

"I'm- I'll go now." Bill says after a breath and smiles though Missy is no longer looking at her and is lifting the lid of her piano.

"I'll try and get some research done- find out where they are- spy stuff, you know?" She babbles as she backs towards the door.

The Mistress can't help the slightest smirk at the human's inane talk and momentary pause as she tries to decide what to play.

"Stay safe, alright?" Bill stammers before the doors are open and she's gone and the Mistress feels more in control again as she watches the doors outside her room close with a confused sort of amusement playing through her mind and running through her fingers as she begins to play softly.

* * *

The Doctor comes in several hours afterwards with food.

It's boring- she's had it what feels like a million times before.

Still she is thankful and takes it and eats at a small table which the Doctor drags to the couch after looking at it with a frown, sitting on the other side.

There's a prickling discomfort with being even this distance from her room without Bill being there and it's not long before the Mistress is placing her hands in her lap to hide their shaking.

"I'm- I'm sorry. I'm not hungry." The Time Lady says uncertainly, eyes directed to her lap.

The Doctor doesn't do much but nod.

"Go on then." He says and the Mistress retreats hastily to her enclosure, sighing in relief as the door closes behind her.

Time Lords don't really need to eat every day.

"Thank you." Missy says, not meeting the Doctor's eyes or looking above the ground in front of her as her fingers twist together.

The door closes before she finishes and the Mistress swallows, closing her eyes.

They'll save him.

They have to.

She'll save the Doctor again.


	9. Chapter 9

Next chapter's on the 11th of August.

* * *

When Bill arrives the Mistress is in the middle of playing a children's nursery rhyme she's picked up from the humans at some point in her travels. If she thinks on the composition it's probably from after their 30th century given the themes. Those were a strange few years she spent on that ship.

She halts as soon as she hears the doors begin to open and watches them expectantly, unsure as to whether it has been long enough for it to be either Bill or the Doctor again.

More and more since the split in time she feels it escaping her, slipping through her fingers.

She'll have to work faster if she wants to keep herself together.

It's Bill this time and the Time Lady catches herself smiling slightly as she looks at the far younger woman, hair pulled back efficiently in a way which seems disconnected to what the Doctor had told her about the girl in the earlier timeline.

She seems troubled though this time, frowning a little as she closes the doors again and approaches Missy's enclosure, not looking at her though it doesn't seem purposeful or intended.

The Mistress tilts her head, frowning too.

"Are you alright?" She asks, voice softer than usual.

Bill looks up and smiles tiredly. It doesn't reach her eyes.

"Yeah- it's just difficult." She says then pauses, frowning once again, "If we can remember and people are being arrested for not believing that they've lived without the monks there must be some people somewhere who know the truth about all this. It can't just be us so where are they?" The human asks, hands gesturing for the separate groups of people who must know and themselves, emphasising the gap between them. She looks back at Missy who watches her curiously and flushes a little.

"Sorry. It's just frustrating." Bill says with a shrug which suggests her lack of real sorrow for her complaining and makes the Mistress' lips quirk into the beginnings of a smile momentarily, "What's the number anyway?" She asks, looking back at Missy with a hand hovering over the keypad.

"Four, seven, six, three, two, zero, five." Missy recites, standing as she does to wait in front of the door, "You didn't think saving the world was going to be easy, did you?" The Time Lady asks.

"He makes it look easy though." Bill murmurs as the door clicks open.

The Mistress can't help but laugh at that, holding the door frame for support as she pushes it open.

"The Doctor is and has always been an idiot. His schemes are so harebrained that no one knows how to react to their many failings and get so caught up in it that they lose." The Time Lady says dismissively, still laughing a little.

Bill is quiet and Missy feels anxiousness settle in her chest again as she steps outside of her box.

"Maybe you're looking in the wrong places." She says to fill the quiet, "Underground rebellions can be hard to find. Sometimes you need just a little something luck or to look in the right place- someone wearing something that doesn't quite fit with everyone else- a symbol. Think about what the monks are trying to hide from you- sometimes humans will gather in areas symbolising the things being kept from you. You're all hopelessly romantic." The Mistress explains, filling enough time for her to take a few steps towards the sofa without thinking too much about being outside. She bites down on her lip a little as Bill passes her easily, collapsing onto the furniture and takes another step, hand moving to the back of a chair to ground her.

"So I go and sit around in the history section of libraries until someone approaches me wearing a green carnation?" Bill asks sarcastically.

The Mistress gets to the back of the sofa, throat feeling tighter as she grips the back of it and releases to walk around it.

"No." She says, carefully sitting down and folding her hands in her lap again, one wrapped in the other, "You might have to start some of it yourself." The Time Lady admits, leaning back a little bit as she begins to think about the problem.

"Where do you think has been most affected by the monks? Who would have the biggest reason to remember?" The Mistress asks, fixing her gaze on Bill who is still slumped into the couch, back pressed into the seat of it and head forced upwards by the pillow at the back.

The human sighs heavily and pulls herself into a slightly more normal sitting position. She stares back at the Time Lady and frowns, thinking.

"I guess anyone who wants free will really- people who value difference. Huge history nerds. Teenagers. Everyone really. I can't think of anyone who would actually want this." Bill says, hoping that the Mistress will make something useful out of her words though they're said without hope.

The Time Lady grins despite herself and leans forwards pointing at Bill.

"Exactly! So. All you have to do is show that there's an alternative. Make a symbol, make a meeting point and then when you have people you can make a plan." The Mistress says.

Bill furrows her brows in disbelief, fighting her own smile.

"You think I should start an underground movement on a whole world covered with police and people who would tell the police?" She says incredulously.

"Yes. It's not like I can do it for you." Missy points out and scoffs, leaning forwards animatedly, "Besides- what happened to the internet? There have always been spaces on there for secret societies to organise even plainly in public view- the monks can't have crushed all of that." The Time Lady says, rolling her eyes in disbelief.

Bill is watching her curiously, pulling her legs up between them and folded to her chest and wrapping her arms around them loosely.

"So I need a symbol." The human says, "I can't exactly get 'the monks are a lie' mass produced on a pin badge without getting taken away. Clothes are monk-issued and I can't bulk buy fake flowers when no one even seems to grow real flowers anymore." She explains frustratedly.

The Mistress thinks again, looking over Bill's clothes. The lack of colour hits her again and she blinks as an idea comes to her.

The Time Lady begin to unbutton her blazer and Bill instantly puts out her hands, panicking and blushing.

"What are you doing?" The human asks, eyes tearing upwards to look at Missy's.

"I thought that was obvious." The Mistress says, raising an eyebrow as she finishes removing the clothing, turns the sleeve inside out and plucks at a loose thread in the lining near the shoulder join, "I had a few things sewn into the lining in case I needed them. They won't be immediately useful but this-" She says, tearing off a small piece of the lilac lining, "This can be useful." The Mistress says, patting it over the left pocket on Bill's chest.

"It shows up against the darker colour without being really noticeable and everyone can find their own scrap of different coloured fabric to show they've noticed yours without even having talked to you. It marks you out as different and people who agree with you are more likely to use it than people who don't because of that. It will take time but that might be for the best." The Time Lady explains, slipping her jacket back on and rebuttoning it.

Bill is silent a moment, looking down at it but smiles a little and nods, not meeting Missy's gaze.

"Yeah. I think I can work with that." Bill says. Her smile widens as she changes the subject.

"And look at you- you've been sat here the whole time and you've been alright." She says, gently and playfully knocking the Time Lady's arm.

The Mistress' mind shoots back to the fact that she's outside her enclosure and feels the prickling up her spine again, the wrongness.

She manages a smile despite that.

"Yes. I suppose I have." She murmurs, smile fading quickly as her eyes dart back to her cage to check that it's still there and that she's still okay.

There's a hand around hers then, far warmer than her own skin. She looks back into dark eyes and a soft smile as the pressure of the touch increases just a little.

"You're doing really well Missy." Bill says and the Mistress feels her smile flit back for another moment.

"I also need to know everything you can tell me about the monks if you can remember that for me?" The human asks and the Time Lady breathes in and out and nods.

"Yes. I can do that. Yes." She says, closing her eyes briefly as Bill lets go of her hand and brings out a small plain notebook and a pencil.

They can do this.


	10. Chapter 10

Next chapter's on the 22nd of September.

* * *

"I. I would like to go back now." The Mistress says, hating the stutter as she holds onto the notebook and pencil tightly.

Bill smiles again, that easy and gentle smile.

"Go on then. You know the way." She teases and the Time Lady can't help but smile a little bit herself, almost laughing.

She stands, hand going to the back of the chair, grounding, then the end table and then she's almost there and then she's in. Safe.

The Mistress goes to close the door and Bill stands too, opposite her on the other side of the glass.

"You know. You can write anything you like in there." The human says, shifting her weight to the side, "Not just about the monks." She clarifies.

"If you want."

Missy hums in thanks and shuts the door just as Bill reaches for it.

"Wait!" She says a moment too late, face going red.

"I- sorry. I have something else for you. What're the numbers again?" Bill asks, left hand in her pocket as she steps up to the input box.

"Four, seven, six, three, two, zero, five." The Mistress says, feeling oddly nervous.

Bill flashes her a smile full of white teeth and repeats the numbers under her breath as she types them in. The door clicks open again and Bill pulls it, stepping into the doorway at the top of the tiny set of stairs.

"Here." She says, holding out her left hand, palm open.

A small sharpener sits there, about the size of the end of her thumb, black gloss as if the appearance gave it more value than the plain metal ones.

The Mistress stares at it for a second then back up at Bill's face, cheeks reddened as she scratches the back of her head and her eyes avoid Missy's.

"I don't know how much you'll need to write but it might be useful." The human says.

The Time Lady picks it up, fingers just brushing Bill's palm as she feels its lightness and the warmth from being in Bill's hand.

Her hearts beat a little oddly and she's confused by the discomfort but smiles anyway.

"Thank you." She says softly, not looking at the woman's face.

"Ah. No problem! I guess I'll be off?" Bill says, backing away as if it's a question, face still really quite red.

"Oh. Yes." The Mistress says after a second, "Goodbye."

The sharpener is still warm in her fist, rounded edges smooth against her palm.

"Don't forget." The Time Lady says as Bill opens the outside doors, "Find people and you'll find the place." Her hands rests against the door in front of her, still open as Bill turns, smiling.

"Ah- yeah. I won't. Goodbye Missy."

"Goodbye. Bill." The Mistress says as the double doors close.

She waits there a few minutes longer before closing the door to her enclosure and hearing the click. The sharpener slips easily into her pocket as she sits down at the piano and starts to write.

* * *

The Mistress is quick to slip the notebook inside the piano and shove the pencil in her pocket when she hears the Doctor coming. As she hears him outside the door she gently puts the support down and closes the top and turns anxiously to watch him as he strides into the room.

He has a bag with him and the Mistress notices suddenly that she's feeling quite hungry.

The Doctor sets out the food on one of the tables outside and drags two chairs over. She thinks that it's what the humans called sushi. She hasn't had it before.

She stands at the piano, fingers entwined in front of her as she watches him open the glass door.

He stares back at her, cold in a way which makes her want to reach for him.

She doesn't because she knows somehow that this him wouldn't appreciate that but it doesn't change the fact that she wants to take his face in her hands and ask what horribly mundane moral dilemma he's struggling with today and kiss his nose.

She misses the old timeline.

She misses her old friend and the caution which he'd had before which had stopped him from letting her touch him rather than this iciness.

"Are you going to come out?" He asks, waiting outside the open door.

"Right. Yes. Of course." The Mistress murmurs, stepping outside and taking a deep breath as she feels tension run up her spine again, glad that sitting with Bill earlier had braced her somewhat for this.

Thankfully it's not far to the table.

The Doctor pulls out the chair and Missy almost smiles, remembering how he used to do that for her.

He sits down in it though and the memory turns a little bit painful so she focuses instead on walking to the other side of the table, sitting down and then on choosing which thing to try first.

"It's sushi." The Doctor says, "A lot of humans seem to like it." And then he's quiet again, watching her as she picks a piece up with a pair of chopsticks he'd placed by the side of her plate, smooth, pale wood.

She puts it in her mouth whole and finds it very different to anything she's tried before. There's something almost crisp but not quite about the salty, papery layer around the outside- _seaweed_ she identifies- and the rice is sticky and almost sweet. She thinks it might have been cooked with rice wine but it's been more than a few years since she's drank some from this period to confirm. There are flecks of something sour too, buried inside it, a pickle of some sort maybe though she isn't so familiar with whatever has been pickled.

All in all she's not very familiar with Earth cuisine that wasn't English take-out given the last half a century.

But this is interesting and new and _different_.

The Doctor picks up a piece from his plate, seemingly uninterested in her now that she's started eating.

"There's soy sauce too, and wasabi. Don't put on too much though." He says, pointing with a chopstick to a smallish bottle filled with a dark liquid and a small tube, "The soy sauce is salty and makes things taste more fishy and the wasabi is spicy." The Time Lord informs her.

"Thank you." The Mistress says, too intrigued by this new food to notice how closely the Doctor watches her.

* * *

By the time they've finished the food the Mistress feels strangely comfortable outside the enclosure, unfamiliar flavours still on her tongue.

The Doctor stares at her strangely still and the Time Lady looks just to the side of him as he lays his hands on top of the table, fingers steepled.

The Mistress starts to shift, looks back to the piano in her room and wishes that she were in there again even if the Doctor was going to keep looking at her. She's about to ask to leave when he speaks again, voice low, a warning.

"If you plan to hurt any of the humans on this planet then the monks and I will stop you." He says, eyes meeting hers as she looks to him properly in shock and stands abruptly.

The chair clatters to the floor behind her but she doesn't hear it as she brings her palms down onto the table heavily.

The Doctor starts, flinching away as she leans towards him, unthinking, unthinking, the her from this timeline lost to the anger like fire that consumes her at the idea that the stupid man in this timeline can't see that it's not something the alternate her would ever do.

"I'm not going to hurt any of the humans! I wouldn't do that! Not now! Why can't you see that I've changed Doctor! Are you really that _blind_! Or maybe you're as stupid as the Academy thought you were!" She spits, fingernails bending against the tabletop.

The Time Lord opposite her seems to struggle for a moment though she swears as she turns and stalks off to the bathroom she sees the barest flicker of a smile on his face between expressions.

As she slams the door and locks it, half her mind still an inferno and the other half of her oddly intent on taking a bath she can hear him run after her and bang on the door.

"I thought I should warn you! I know Bill's been here a lot lately! The humans are under our protection!" The other Time Lord yells, giving another half hearted rattle of the doorknob before he gives in and leaves.

"That's what I'm fucking doing you incompetent asshole." The Mistress hisses though she knows he can't hear her over the water running.

She knows that he'll wait for her. He'll still be outside when she's finished, waiting to lock her in again like a caged animal.

Keep the disaster contained. Can't have it escaping.

The Mistress growls at the thoughts, almost tearing the buttons off her jacket in her haste to strip it off, plucking at them like a hungry bird. She almost chokes herself on her scarf as she unties the bow and throws it to the side where it floats down to the ground.

The buttons on her shirt go next as swiftly as those on her jacket and she pulls out a few of the pins in her hair, letting them fall to the floor, tinkling at the impact.

She undoes her skirt, untucking the open shirt from it and lets the layers fall heavily around her legs. Finally she yanks her arms out of the shirt and jacket, dropping it and huffing out an irritated breath at the corset, shoes and stockings still to go.

The unexpected clink stops her short and she scrambles for the jacket again, confused, still warm fabric clutched to her chest as she fishes in the pocket for whatever had made the noise and pulls out a glossy black sharpener.


	11. Chapter 11

Next chapter's on the 3rd of November.

* * *

She drops the clothes again and sits on the edge of the bathtub, hair half undone, corset still tight around her waist and stockings still caught high up her legs and feet still in heels. Absentmindedly she rolls the small object in her hand, mind quiet suddenly as she feels the cool metal.

She reaches back, unlacing her corset with a deft hand and sighing at the relief of being able to breathe properly again. The Time Lady presses her thighs together and places the sharpener in the join before unhooking the corset at the front and discarding it too to the floor.

She largely ignores the welts along her skin, running fingers briefly over them and feeling where each piece of boning and fold in the fabric had pressed. It's not quite uncomfortable despite the soreness and the slightest purple tinge some of them have taken against the pink.

The rest of the pins she can find in her hair follow as her clothes had gone. Her eyes are still stuck downwards on the small piece of metal between her thighs.

It doesn't take long too much more calmly unclasp her stockings from the suspender belt and roll them down, unclasping the belt too and letting it fall on top of the corset.

At last she unbuckles her shoes and slips them off, taking the stockings with them.

The Mistress picks up the sharpener again, feeling the way its edges are rounded and the smooth gloss of the paint. She stands and takes a towel from the shelf on the wall and deposits it on top of her clothes to dry herself off later and protect them somewhat for now.

It's strange to feel tile beneath her feet, smooth and cold and not at all forcing them into a specific pattern. The Time Lady becomes suddenly aware of the way each foot can press into the ground.

She uses the heel of the foot to lift the toes, lowering them back down so that everything except the arch can feel the firmness, the solidity beneath her, and then up, through her ankles, through her calves, into her thighs and her hips as she watches her feet peel off the floor, the motion strangely fluid given how long it's been since she's used her body in that way, up onto her toes which spread, pushing against the ground as she balances, suspends herself in gravity which pulls her down again, balance not quite right, and onto the whole of her feet.

She tests it a few times, slowly reintroducing herself to the way her feet move without the constraint of clothing, her legs, her hips, her arms, her torso, her neck.

The Mistress had never thought of her clothes as inhibiting before but now she feels strangely new, regenerated, to be out of them as she stretches and twists.

She chuckles softly, curiously, more a noise of acknowledgement than a real laugh as she unfurls and closes her hand, fingers seeming like some odd creature or plant as they close in on themselves and the rounded piece of metal, warm now in her palm.

With only a slight reluctance the Time Lady turns to the bath and begins to run the water.

Her empty right hand passes through it, testing the temperature and finding it acceptable.

On the side of the bathtub, on the shelf which is formed between the lip and the wall by smooth tiling, there sit a collection of plastic bottles. The Mistress takes a moment to let her brain translate, still turning the small chunk of metal over in her hand like waves tumbling stone to sand.

The tall bottle with a dark green liquid is revealed to be bubble bath- rosemary and mint, supposedly good for waking up in the morning if the bottle is to be believed. It goes in until the Mistress is satisfied with the amount of foam starting to form on the surface and the pale green tinge of the water against the white porcelain of the bathtub.

She places the sharpener on the side of the bath where it won't get knocked and stands to let the tub fill.

The mirror seems strange when she looks at it, the reflection seeming somewhat alien though she had caught glimpses of herself in the glass of her enclosure.

Her hair is longer than she remembers, far too long in a way which makes her look waifish, bedraggled and ill. The ends are thin and her hair is far too static, thickened in a bad way by dirt and grease and lack of attention.

She cuts her attention from that to her body, taking comfort, despite the discomfort of the fact that she's thinner than she used to be, in the way she still has strength to her, a hardness which is emphasised a little too much by her leanness.  
This cursory analysis performed she moves on to her face, washed out by the lights and by the lack of time outside.

Her eyes are eerily blue, bereft of the makeup which usually frames them but they and the rest of her is undoubtedly still her, still her body.

From the myriad of scars and wrinkles and protruding veins and welts from the corset and bitten nails and the way that she tilts her head considering there is this screaming sense of her.

The Mistress grins, teeth sharp as she laughs a little.

There's something comforting in seeing herself again.

No.

In seeing herself in herself despite everything that has happened since she last looked at herself properly.

The splashing of the bathwater draws her attention again and she lets herself look away from herself, feeling free in a strange way.

She switches the tap off with a sharp movement and slips into the bubbles and water with a sigh, feeling the warmth ease the lingering tension as it passes her feet, her calves, her thighs, her waist, her chest, her neck, her head, her arms.

The Mistress submerges herself completely, not quite holding her breath as she lets the respiratory bypass kick in and the air in her lungs recycles itself. Her eyes closed she feels the silk of water against her skin. Everything seems distant as she drifts in warmth and gentleness.

If there was sound it would tunnel away from her as she begins to slip away from herself, unmoored by the way she is held, supported the way she hasn't felt in so long, perhaps ever.

Eventually, with the reluctance of the waking, the Mistress pushes herself up and out, taking in a gasped breath to refresh her lungs and another, and another.

Her hair sticks to her face as her chest heaves and Rassilon- it's been a long time since she's used her body properly. She shudders at the sweet ache of her real capabilities, left to atrophy for so long.

She should never forget who she really is.

It's a decision made as she sweeps wet hair from her face and shoulders and her gaze fixes on the sharpener, sitting at the end of the tub as clear as anything else in the room.

She's not human.

The Mistress feels the presence of the sharpener like a physical weight pulling her eyes but doesn't allow it to hold her.

She takes the bottle described as shampoo and tries to lather up the roots of her hair, letting her nails scratch as the dirt on her scalp, dislodging it. It takes several rounds of shampoo to get it to lather properly and the colour of the water beneath the bubbles shows this effort well. The conditioner is thick as she runs it through her hair from just below the base of her neck to the ends and leaves it.

She leans forwards and scrubs at her skin with the bar of soap, enjoying the small pleasure of delicately removing the paper packaging before using it.

The pinkness of her skin, a clean, raw pinkness, makes her smile as she picks at her nails, evening out the edges as best she can.

Even the bottoms of her feet, after a rather difficult period of contortion, are rubbed until no dead skin clings to them.

She stands when she is done and steps onto the towel on her clothes, letting the remnants of water drip onto it before she sits back and begins towelling herself off, unable to stop the smile which comes with the sheer contentment she feels in being clean again and being able to clean herself.

When she looks into the mirror and sees herself smiling, caught mid-drying her leg and standing on the other, she laughs to herself and at the happiness she can tell in that image of her. Her gaze shifts to the sharpener sitting less than a meter away and she feels her smile change, soften, as behind it the dirty, gritty water covered by a tainted film of bubbles drifts down the drain.


	12. Chapter 12

Next chapter's on the 15th of December. Sorry this is a day late- I was at a conference and didn't have wifi, haha!

* * *

The Mistress goes to the toilet and then redresses in the clothes she had abandoned on the floor.

Suspender belt, suspenders, corset. Blouse, skirt, jacket. Necktie. Boots.

It's a little it like putting her armour back on, lacing herself up tight, straightening a few creases and then winding and plaiting her hair, retrieving the pins from the floor and watching as she slowly constructs herself again, in a stronger image, ready for the fighting that will have to come and the her that she will have to be again.

Her hands almost shake as she bites at her lip to quell the laugh which wants to burst from her as she looks at herself in the mirror, wet hair looking tangled, only half up, and hunched over to avoid getting as much water in her clothes as possible.

She looks even more like a mad woman more than she usually does.

In a few more minutes she is composed again, still grinning as she feels the steady trickling of water down her neck wick down the back of her blouse, already soaked at the back of her neck, and shuddering a little at the sensation.

It's unpleasant but after having been in the clothes while she was dirty for so long it still has the comfort of novelty and of knowing that she's clean.

The newer side of her panics as the Mistress drops the towels on the floor, leaving them for the Doctor to pick up later as she instead picks up the sharpener and slips it into her pocket again, patting it to make sure it's there and safe.

She feels for the pencil in the other just to make sure it's there and nods, reasserting her old self over the timid, cowering new her.

The Doctor clearly notices a difference in her.

He says nothing as she clicks the lock open and steps out, reading as if he still has complete control of the situation from one of the chairs facing away from the bathroom door.

Her heels click against the ground as she feels an upwelling of nervousness and her hearts beat too fast.

Somehow she manages to keep her pace steady and her gait even as she walks straight into her box and slams the glass door closed pointedly. The relief which comes with closing the door chills her and calms her hearts as she closes her eyes, sighing only a little as she settles herself at her piano stool and begins to play.

Neither of them make any outward sign of paying attention to the other, the silence of their voices echoing despite the Mistress' attempts to drown it out in sound.

Eventually he walks out and seals the doors behind him.

Somehow it feels like a victory even as her hand stumbles over a few wrong notes.

* * *

Several days pass before Bill comes again.

The Mistress is surprised that she somewhat longs for Bill to visit again.

It's not exactly because she feels bored. Although that is the case.

It's also not to do with loneliness. That's just not really something that affects her.

It's not related to needing something from the girl or having some vital information to give her. Technically she could be here and forever and be fine though she would probably eventually end up finally killing the Doctor out of sheer frustration with the Time Lord. It's not like Bill's planning on reproducing so it would take less than a century anyway for him to go back to some form of normal hopefully.

That's a few blinks of the eye for someone who lives as long as they will.

The Doctor's company isn't even that bad.

Sure, he barely speaks and seems even less competent than before but he doesn't bring up the idea of her hurting the humans again even if he watches her a little more closely when he's there which he is more often than usual now. He even brings her a change of clothes which makes her feel more comfortable than she has in a while. The amount of food starts to lessen again so her appetite stabilises and she starts to pick at what he serves her again.

She doesn't thank him for either of those things and feels a strange kind of vindictive pleasure in the act which is perhaps a little childish given that this version of him especially probably doesn't care but still she feels it and hides her grin by turning to her piano again.

* * *

Bill apologises as soon as she comes in, worry blaring from her like some kind of siren.

"I'm sorry it's been a few days! I got caught up in everything and there were more people than I thought but we're doing... Something." She says, hand already pressed up against the glass door as she looks at the Mistress who stretches from her seat and tucks the pencil, quite worn down now, and pencil sharpener back into her pocket and closes the notebook.

"I'm really sorry. I wanted to come- I promise I did but things just…" The girl trails off and the Time Lady fixes her with a puzzled look as the human's right hand lays forgotten over the keypad.

The Mistress snorts out a laugh, smirking a little.

"Revolutions take time. _I_ know this better than anyone." The Time Lady says, standing up, book in one hand and taking the few half-strides it takes to get to the door.

Bill very clearly looks, saying nothing though her cheeks redden a little and she tries to avert her eyes.

"The code's four, seven, six, three, two, zero, five." Missy prompts, rolling her eyes in amusement as she leans on one hip, arms folded.

The human snaps to attention, quickly typing in the key code and then standing back to let the Mistress open the door and step out, giving her back control.

The Mistress swallows, feeling that same anxiety swell up inside her but knowing that she can ignore it and has done it several times now and nothing bad has happened.

She pushes the door open and sits on the couch, walking past Bill.

The Time Lady reconsiders and switches to the metal fold up chair opposite the sofa. It's only two meters further away but it's enough to feel a little more difficult and she can still see her enclosure opposite, that the door is open and that it's still there and that she can go back if she needs to.

It's disturbing but comforting.

"You changed." Bill says, not meeting the Mistress' gaze as she slowly walks up to sit on the couch opposite.

"Not completely. The jacket is the same." Missy informs the other woman, pulling on the cuffs of her sleeves in emphasis as she straightens her arms out.

"The Doctor saw fit to find me some clean clothes." The Mistress explains, smiling softly again.

"They suit you." The human says, tripping over the words.

The Time Lady can't help but laugh and Bill just flushes further.

* * *

The two women discuss what the Mistress has managed to recall until Bill can explain it herself, omitting quite obviously the fact that killing Bill would fix it in case someone were to take the easy route. The Mistress has another plan, she thinks, somewhere in the back of her head but she can't speak of it yet, not solid enough for human concepts and their certainties.

They spend a few more minutes, carefully testing the Time Lady's comfort zone in being outside while Bill half-distracts her by telling her what she's learned about this new world from her small group of revolutionaries.

The Mistress smiles gently, a little tired but not feeling too anxious as she watches Bill talk, hands everywhere as the Time Lady stays perfectly still, chin in her hand as her arms fold over the back of a single dining chair from a different set than any of the others in the room.

It's nice to have something to listen to other than herself and she begins to feel bits and pieces filter through her brain and be sorted, several dropping into the plan at the back of her mind, dissolving into the mix of things which she can't quite articulate yet in the human's language but hopefully will be able to soon.

* * *

When Bill leaves she promises to bring another pencil next time.

The Mistress closes the door of her enclosure when the woman is gone and submits to letting her mind drift, catching parts of the plan which is ever so slowly crystallising in the back of her head like a jellyfish catching food.


End file.
